represent earl joins us. [captioning performed by national captioning institute] [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2013] host: good morning even it's tuesday, march 19, 2013. a lot happening today. the congress returns for one week of legislative work before returning on spring break. and president obama this evening heads overseas far trip to the middle east for a meeting with israel's prime minister on wednesday. meanwhile the front page says workers are saving too little to retire. 57% reported less than $25,000 in total household savings and

investments. we'll begin there. and ats, republicans independents call on the lines below. your retirement and savings. or post your comments on facebook.com/c-span and email us at journal@c-span.org. here's "the wall street journal" this morning a front page story about this new report expected to come out today, and it says here workers and customers in the u.s. are bracing for a retirement crisis even as the stock market sits near highs and the economy shows improvement.

host: so we're getting your take on this. your retirement andization. tell us if you are and why and if you are not, why not? it's a story in the "usa today" as well this morning confidence in retirement continues to flail about this report, because americans have to cope with many immediate financial

concerns retirement is taking a backseat. only 2% of workers and a% of retirees say retirement is their most pressing issues. among other worries -- host: at least many americans have a more realistic perspective about retirement says the senior vice president of retirement and investor services at the principle financial group.

host: in arkansas, a democrat, are you saving? caller: yes, i save every penny i can get my hands on. host: 401-k or how are you saving? caller: c.d.'s and bank accounts that are ensured. host: why not put it in the market? caller: i can't afford to lose it. i've seen too many people lose their behinds and with what little money i've saved all my life, i can't afford to lose it. i'm about a 52 and 10-15 years to retirement. host: have you ever put anytime the market caller: no. that's the only reason i've saved any amount of money i have. i've got about $30,000 in safings. host: how much do you think you need to retire on? caller: i would venture to say i would feel comfortable in i

had $100,000 or $200,000. host: you're 52. to get to a couple hundred thousand how much longer do you think you will have to work? >> probably all my life host: and what do you do? caller: i'm a custodian at a high school. host: how much does it give you? caller: it's about $8 an hour and i don't go out to eat or to movies. pretty much my tv is basically my only entertainment. and watching you every morning is one of my shows. host: well, we appreciate that, tim. from the "wall street journal" front page story. they say scott is 49 years old, a small business owner and his wife owned two candy stores. to own two ay

children's stores. he said they made two contributions but the total amount in the couple's retirement is less than $200,000 which is considered inadequate. the percentage of workers who have saved for retirement plunged in 2009 according to this report. ly about half of the workers surveyed said they were sure they could come up with $2,000 if an unexpected need were to arise in the next month. from a report i want to show you one of the charts they have in it. here is time frame of when retirers began to plan financially forretirees that -- this is what it shows. 34% started planning for retirement 20 years or more before they retired. 19% 10-19 years before and

five to nine years before and 4% started to plan the year before and/or and 2% the year they retired. so the majority of people doing it years out but 10-19 years out of retirement, 32%. five nine years out 19% of those surveyed said that's when they started planning. republican line, are you saving? caller: i'm 51 years old and i'm not saving a lot of money however i think people shouldn't depend on social security when they retire instead of retiring the if they don't have enough money to report their standard of living ybe they should work part-time but then because of the competition, their pensions are not going to be available. nd i support boehner as --

they are doing a great job. and in some cases we have republican control of the majority of the control of congress and the presidency and in other cases you will have democrats. host: you're 31 years old and not saving. do you have a job or can you ut money into a 401-k or 403 -b? caller: yes, but i don't think that's going to supplement my living when i get to that age. host: so what are you going to do? caller: i'm going to work as much as i can and understanding that if you have a business or if you decide to purchase property and then rent it out, i mean, there's a lot of ways of making yourself happy. but don't just depend on social security or your pension. you have to have other sources

of revenue. host: as a 31-year-old not saving much, what are your thoughts in investing in the market? caller: well, it has gone to the highest but i have 401-k's. i don't personally invest in the stock market. i don't go into the e-trade or anything like that. i'm planning on focusing on paying down my student loan, paying down -- i'm leasing an apartment, paying off my car. so i have a lot of more -- host: what's your student loan payment a month? >> it's about $450. host: how much do you have in debt if you don't mind telling us? caller: total in order to get an mba i went to cal state and accrued about $40,000. host: thanks for the phone call. here's a tweet saying the fed's low interest rate make savings

an expense. democratic caller, hi joseph. caller: how are you doing this morning? host: morning. caller: i've been watching you guys and wanted to talk to you about this. host: ok, go ahead. caller: if i make a joke out of retire and i retired in 2000 and used to work in the oil farm in south buoy. and i came out couple years after the firemen got killed. i got my pension and my 401-k. i'm in local 57 and i was the last one to -- the express way and blue route and i still think the 401-k can do it but now they are taking the 401-k and putting it in the stock and once in a while you go up and down but when i came out i had mean so i got my social security and my pension. now personally, my social security and my pensions, i get two pensions because if you do

another trade you get another pension. i did 30 years and 75 years. host: so joseph, are you going to be able to live comfortably in retirement? caller: well, i'm not really comfortable but i am comfortable in a way. my car is paid for. my property is paid for. i got three properties. i got my dad's properties. he retired from a long shoreman and he passed away so my young zest living in his property and i'm living in mine so i'm feeling good but it's not stable. and i'm watching everything, so everything is i ain't going nowhere. host: this morning we're talking about a new report out that says workers are saving too little to retire and a second report out saying that life expectancy is going to cause problems for corporate pensions and from the "wall

street journal" this morning on pensions, they write pensions have become a much smaller component of america's retirement savings mix over the years. it is covered only by so-called defined benefit plans fell from 28% in 1979 and companies that still offer pensions might have to kick in more money to account for longer life spans. he actuaries added aadjustments to -- to the mortality rates and companies are expected to start using the new asuccessful,s this year. a male who reaches age 65 in 2013 is expected to live an additional 20.5 years from 19.5 in the earlier projections. expected ing 65 are

o live an durable 22.7 years frup 21.3. one reason is its global nsion funding gap widened to $3.5 billion last year from $3.1 billion. it's because they saw a longevity of our participants. host: joe in california, independent, very early morning, joe, thank you for calling in. are you saving? caller: no. i'm already retired. i wanted to say, i started saving for my retirement at 20 years old and by the way i did it was by -- and i also got hurt on my job at the age of 49. and was on disability for two

years and couldn't return to my job. but because -- with a great pension, i was able to draw my full pension at 52 years old, and i'm 60 years old now. i don't have to worry about where my money is coming from. it's coming directly from the teachers pension plan. if i would have had a 401-k and got hurt at 52 years old, i couldn't have drawn out of it until i was 59 but with the economy in 2007 and on, i would have lost everything i had in my 401-k. host: so do you think you have enough money the to last from your retirement? caller: oh, absolutely. and my wife for her would if i die before her she would get 3/4 of my pension for the rest

of her life. host: so from the teamsters? caller: yes. so my union dues are for my retirement. caller: good morning, greta. host: good morning. caller: i've been retired since 2006 and in 2008 i lost half of my 401-k. it really -- it put a cut in what i was getting, but i'm still doing ok. but you know what the problem is on, you know, the federal government and the banks don't want you to save money, because the banks can get their money from the fed for 0% so why would they let people save money. they would dread you put the money in the stock market and take a chance you're going to gain or lose. it's against a person wanting

to save money. host: when did you start saving? caller: i'd say about 20 years before i retired. host: and you retired at what age? caller: 59. old enough to start drawing my 401-k. host: so the company you work for provided a 401-k? that's when you started investing? caller: yes, but you know they didn't match anything. what i put in there was my money but we had profit sharing. but they never matched what i put in. it was my money. host: do you think that -- did you ever use a financial advisor? caller: no. i got my money in chase, managed accounts, they managed my money. before it was through fidelity, and i could manipulate it

myself, and that's when i lost half my money, because i didn't move it fast enough, and i took a big hit. host: so you didn't take it out of riskiers a credits? >> yes. that's -- riskier assets? >> yes. that's what happened there. host: more on your retirement and savings. here is the front page of the state newspaper this morning -- a story by gina smith for the island. turnout will decide today's election for the first congressional seat in south carolina. gina smith is joining us on the phone this morning. gina smith, tell me about this race. who is running and why? guest: good morning. this is like christmas morning for me. i'm so excited. this is really an exciting race, because 18 republicans, two democrats, an incredibly

crowded field but some of the names in this race just make it delicious to watch. we have mark sham ford, the former governor who most of the nation remembers as the guy who slipped out of the country in 2009 so he could visit his mistress, and he -- everyone thought he was hiking the appalachian trail but he was up with a female. so governor sanford is back on his redemption tour, we also family member 's and steven colbert, the comedian, his sister. and a lot of mudslinging which outh carolina is infamous for. host: so sanford is is leading

for the primary? guest: yes. it was a comeback story that you thought if it happened it would be five or eight years from now but in four short years mark sanford has managed to turn this completely around and has been talking on t.b.s. about forgiveness and second chances and reminding his voters about his history as of nor and his member congress talking about his record and that's resonating with voters who feel concerned about federal spending and the federal debt, and they just see mark sanford as the guy who could fix it. and they seem to be willing to look past the problems from 2009.

host: so is he the clear frontrunner? will he come out ahead of today's primary without a runoff? if not, what happens next? caller: guest: i don't think he is going to be able to get the majority of votes. there's definitely going to be a runoff. who he is going to be in the runoff with is yet to be determined. there were several candidates separated bay couple points. teddy turner is one. and a thunderstormer charleston county counselor down here, he hasn't spent a lot of money and is not a big i.d. guy. doesn't have a lot of ads and the ones he has are pretty low quality, to be honest but he has tapped into the home school

community. he has done a good job of getting a lot of support from evangelical christians in the area and these are people who aren't interested in what the tv ads are saying. they know him because they have gone to church with him and he has two or three talk shows so those people who are turned off for lack of a better words -- host: you are the reporter that caught the governor at the airport when he was returning from argentina, is this playing a role? >> it is. it is for those voters. like i said, i feel that more voters are looking past it. this is the nk

guy to send to washington. he has been in the public like for 20 years and we know what he is about and what he stands for, and there's only seven of the -- so they want him to go into caucus meetings and drop the stink bomb when it comes to federal spending. but there is a group that has a problem with that affair and -- host: gina smith, is this likely to end up in republican or democratic hands? whose seat will whoever wins fill? >> it's more likely going to go to whoever wins the republican runoff. it was brought on by republican state lawmakers, and it's very

ch what it means for the epublicans and while ms. colbert is well-financed and her brother has been here in south carolina campaigning for her and they have been doing fundraising together her message is not going to work with so many of the voters in this district. host: thank you very much for your time. guest: thank you. host: update on the first congressional seat with their . imary runoff now republican richard, hi there. caller: hi. i'm retired four different times. state of alaska, state of virginia, 20 years military and

social security. being in the military. part b at medicare $114 a month. i lose my -- so i'm paying for it twice. i paid for it in the military for 20 years of honorable service now paying $114 a month for medicare. or else i lose my provider, and i think that's a tax they are putting on people with -- bilities and trying to got to pay on their disability. and those with legionnaires disease or h.i.v., dirty needles.

host: ray, atlanta, georgia, republican party. good morning. caller: good morning. very interesting conversation you're having this morning. i have found that most people pend a fairer amount of time planning for their vacation than for their retirement. i work with a fortune 10 company and have been with them for 28 years so at the water cooler hearing different conversations if you ask people how much money they have in their 401-k, a lot of them have no idea nor do they have any idea on the different plans to put their money in. it's rather appalling, actually. host: ray, how old are you? caller: 52. host: when do you plan to retire? caller: i'm going to work until i'm 62-63 years old. something about public america,

i have a -- family members with retirement pensions about $65,000. being in corporate america my pension is nowhere near that, so if we don't save in our 401-k to make up the difference, there's no-no way we can begin to match what public pension employees going receive. host: we're taking a poll on facebook, your retirement, are you saving? nine people so far have said yes. 11 people have said no. so if you want to tell us your thoughts and take this poll, go to face bok.com/c-span. one says it wasn't -- i was saving until about two years ago when inflation and higher taxes have all but ate that up. ly retire in about six more years. host: there's a report that

found 67% of u.s. workers surveyed reported less than $25,000 in savings. for retirement. resident obama nominated a labor secretary yesterday. senator have iter is vowing to block the choice it says here. shortly after mr. obama made this announcement mr. have iter said he would prevent it until the justice department responds so of ter accusing him spotty enforcement of national voting rights laws. next to that story in the washington times, g.o.p. takes

issue with e.p.a. nominee senator roy blunt saying he will place a hold on jeannie mcathey poised to take over the aines until -- >> and then on the nomination, they come out with a lengthy piece opposing mr. perez saying obama's nominee muscled a city to drop a supreme court case. then on gay marriage, new poll out from washington, d.c. shows record support for gay marriage. this comes ahead of tuesday's oral argument next tuesday's oral argument at the supreme court where they will be taking up two cases related to gay marriage. and then here is the "new york post" with this headline.

host: here's what the former secretary of state had to say in a video posted online. >> suspect marriage for lesbian and gay couples. >> i support it personally and as a matter of policy and law. embedded in a broader effort to advance equality and opportunity for lgbt americans and all americans. like so many others, my personal views have been shaped over time by people i have known and loved. by my experience representing our nation on the world's stage. my devotion to law and human rights and the guiding principles of my faith. host: hillary clinton taking up two cases on that. speaking of the supreme court, there's a "washington post" this morning. justices appear divided on an arizona law the federal registration form that congress does states the most accepting

views require thoonl they swear under oath that they are a citizen but applicants require additional proof and the u.s. court of appeals for the ninth circuit ruled against the state saying arizona could not add requirements to the federal law. still a ruling for arizona could to door for states to add requirements to the federal registration form and the issue seemed to split the court along familiar eye logical lines. as we told you president obama heads to israel tonight and here's "the new york times," ama and in israel seeking to

seek common ground with bring u and how to financial stability to a government crippled by international aid shortfalls and the obama administration last month unfroze hundreds of millions in assistance to the overnment of president mahmoud abbas that had been held up by kong. diane, democratic caller. are you saving for retirement? caller: i am. i had my money in the stock market when it crashed. i was very aggressive, because i was 45 -- between 45 and 50, and i thought i could be aggressive, because i was managing my own money and i lost almost all of my money in the stock market. it was really a bad thing. so i'm a realtor, so when i get

money now, i set up an i.r.a. for myself, but i don't put it in the stock market. i put anytime something called lending club. so i put a little bit of money in there first to see what, you know, how it was and how it would go. and it went really well, so i dumped all my money in there and watched it grow. it's an amazing program. i hear a lot of people fearful about the stock market, and i can see why. host: diane, how do those lending clubs work? >> lending clubs, what it does is loan money to anybody that needs money. they do check your credit. like my husband wanted to take out a loan to pay down or debt, and so he went and took out a loan and i funded some of his money. you can fund these loan.

you can do it on your own or do it with the company that funds them and people pay it back and you get the interest off of it. it's really amazing. >> there are some people of course alike in any program with those defaults are not hurting us. >> any regulation over these? do you know? >> i checked them out, better business bureau. and another place, i can't remember where. but you should check them out. it's worth it. that's where all my money is. and i'm very happy. host: how much money? caller: right now i've got $43,000 and i had $20,000 left in the stock market. i started off -- you can open it up with $5,000 and go from there, but i watched it for quite a while. because i was scared. but it grew and grew and i've just dumped it all in and now

err year whenever i have any, i just put it all in there. host: thank you. independent caller? hi brenda. caller: i was not able to save money for retirement, because i had to live paycheck-by-paycheck, and i couldn't afford to save money. and what little bit -- i did save little bit. but what little bit i saved i lost five years before retirement, because i got cancer. and with copays and dedubblingtibles, that ate up that money. so i had taken a job 15 years before i retired because of the defined pension plan, however, unlike our government employees, that was taken away from me, and i was thrown into a 401-k, so i wound up really getting almost no money from the defined pension plan.

that's what paid for my cancer. host: george in simpsonville, south carolina. are you there? caller: yes. host: you're on the air. caller: with regard to people who try manage their money themselves, i tried to do that for a while and didn't keep an eye on it the way i should have, and i wound up giving it to a family friend who was a financial advisor and that's doing fine. but what i wanted to talk about was that social security, why it's so taboo to talk about privatizing it? if two people killed in a car accident right after they are eligible for social security, that money just goes away. why can't it be privatetized and rules be set up so that people can have that money and

give it to their family when they die? host: here on twitter, it says always has from day one my motto has been pay yourself first. one who does not save is a fool. that's on twitter. if you go to c-span on twitter, you can put up your comments. we're going to take your call. we want to hear from you about your retirement plans. what are you saving? 585-3881 and 202- independents and democratics, call the numbers on the screen. here's the front page of politico on gun legislation with the headline "slim chances for assault weapons ban to be included in any bill that comes to the senate floor."

senate majority harry feinstein said he would allow an amendment for the assault weapons ban but another wrote that diminishes its chances of passage even more. then leaders stop budget defection in the house paul ryan's budget will be on the floor this week and senate democrats introduced their budget last week, and both des are saying none of their talk with are we'll arl and the associated press expected to as

, and efore the hispanic would like to talk about the gang of eight is working on. this comes as the republican national committee yesterday outlines their report for republicans going forward, things the party needs to work on and one of them is embracing comprehensive immigration reform as part of an effort to reach out to minority voters. chris, republican caller. hi, what are your thoughts on saving for retirement? go ahead. caller: good morning from across the river, i was a federal committee and until recently when it was cut in

2010 and i'm on furlough and don't expect to be brought back because of the economy, so i just sought other work and tied to put money away for retirement and find myself working for home depot and they do have a 401-k plan and it's quite good, so i found myself investing in that. but the problem is i don't see a future in retirement. i really don't want to retire. i am saving for it even though that. i know the day is going to come. other people are out there saving for retirement. my wife is saving for retirement. host: are you furloughed because of the sequest center caller: no because president obama cut man space. host: thank you chris for the call. independent caller, hi there. caller: good morning. host: morning. caller: thank you for taking my call. i am saving for retirement. in a pension plan.

however, i'm40. my brother is 39 and had multiple heart attacks. result of that i do help with his medical expenses so, outside of pension, i'm not saving. in addition to that, i'm very uncomfortable there will be any social security left when i reach retirement age. host: all right. out of new jersey today, chris christie's campaign office governor's office put out a campaign announcement yesterday. this is all we have so far that governor chris christie will join community leaders from the lakewood area for a campaign announcement at the 12:45 eastern today. i have not seen any stories out of that yet but in new jersey the "star ledger" below the fold is the headline.

police in the dominican republic say the women lied about men 911 dez and the women were made available for interviews with u.s. journalists days before the election and other newspapers reporting this morning that this was posted of course on the daily caller. and the daily caller posting a statement yesterday saying they are continuing to investigate the videos that they posted on their website. in other news this morning, 0-year anniversary of iraq, and this is from the baltimore sun this morning. secretary -- sectarian unrest remains and the anniversary is marked today when the war was announced in the united states and wednesday when troops invaded iraq. tomorrow, wednesday on the washington journal is when we on washington journal will turn our focus on the war in rook.

"the baltimore sun," iraq is still a broken country and its government is democratically elected but seen as disfunctional. and contractors take in $138 billion from the united states to rebuild iraq. and "the washington post" this orning, 2003-2013 iraqis say they feel better about their security. but worse about economic and political stability citizens . s. military left in late so additional stories about iraq 0 years later and on gun control, headlines -- strong -- would be enforced retro kt ily. that's the "hartford courant" on that. then the colorado governor a long path to gun limits.

eight months later they are poised to sign some of the toughest new gun control laws transforming a company that transformed a western democratic who takes his son shooting into an unlikely front man for gun laws in the united states. they hope the expanded ackground check are signs or -- then next to that story, obituary for you this morning. bruce gardiner, a two- temperature governor diagnosed with parkinson's led a voter's initiative for assisted suicide died at his home in tacoma, washington, he was 76. now to the phones, an independent on the line, are you saving for retirement?

caller: i've been saving $50 a week for 30 years. i'm a c.n.a. and make bhavegly minimum wage. after 30 years of saving $50 a week i have $78,000. which certainly isn't going to be enough money for me to retire on unless i work for another 20 years probably. host: how old are you now, john? caller: i'm 47. host: how long do you plan to work for? caller: probably another 20 years. host: roger in north carolina. hi, roger. caller: yes, current law prohibits issuing pension pavements who aren't retire bud the coalition and unions just finished the commission report that recommend to congress that they change that law now

retirees can have their benefits cut if this goes through congress, so i think everybody needs to start making some phone calls. host: all right our last phone call. up next we will talk to congressman steve pearce about his outreach to minorities, women and young voters and then we will turn our attention to capitol hill with earl. we'll be right back.

>> 34 years ago fay we began providing access to the kong and federal government. the c-span networks created by america's cable companies in 1979 and brought to you as a public service by your cable providers. >> and we can take pictures with m.r.i. or upset scans or c.t. scans and see the whole thing but there's an enormous gap about how the circuits function in the brain as to how i am able to move my hand or to lay down a memory. we don't know how that works. with technology yet to be invented, so a lot of this is going to be technology invented or nano technology. but we need to be able to record hundreds of thousands of brain cells at the same time

and be able to understand how it works. that's brain mas analysis that's at work. we don't really have work yet for milestones and that but it's getting to be a very exciting moment to put together thooth was never thought of. >> dr. francis collins on "q&a." "washington journal" continues. host: and we're back with steve pearce. you were the feature of a front page article. one g.o.p. lawmaker shows how to woo latino voters. what's your attraction? guest: well, we go into areas typically republicans have not gone.

we have some communities that are 85% hispanic. he lulac guys and so it's just many doing my job, frankly. host: with the headline after the r.n.c. put out their report post port you mean the hispanic vote key for republicans to win the election and in this report it said republicans need to vote for or come one some sort of plan, comprehensive immigration reform. do you agree with a pathway to citizenship? guest: well, first let's back up, is that going to be the future? if we do that i don't think that will get us one hispanic vote. they are not driven by simply how we vote on immigration. so i think that may be -- we still are not getting it right.

the pathway to citizenship is very problematic. i've lived along the southern border. i represent that. if you encourage people to come here without documentation illegally and then you give them the citizenship, who wouldn't do that? i mean, who would not want that? so my belief is a guest-worker program with a thumbprint and receipt anyway scan would allow you to go back and forth is far better. i have a friend who was telling me he runs a dairy in eastern new mexico. his top manager would have been -- came under the amnesty under president regan. and that was 1986 and they asked him a couple weeks ago did you ever get the citizenship? he said no. i'm just here to work for my family. i was never here for the citizenship. i think the pathway to citizenship is way overblown, and again, what i think we are going to do is rush down that

outlet saying this is the key to hispanic votes. no, the key to the hispanic votes is working hard in their community. host: some say if you say to hispanics, "we don't want you here" then they start by not agreeing to a path way to citizenship. then they stop listening to you about your policy, and your ideas for education, for the udget, for taxes, etc. guest: what i hear from hispanics who live close to the border is wait, we came here legally for eight years we did everything the right way -- one woman worked for me in the office for years and said this is a dangerous path you're on. she is legal and for 150 is going to work a lot of lawyers

do for $5,000. she said you can't put people here who are not following the law ahead of people who are doing things the right way. so they are divided with this. host: so what is important to them? guest: it's a very broad range of opinions, but many just want the law to be followed. they have got family members, maybe an you think or aunt or sister waiting in their home country and the process is sometimes 18-20 years with congressional help, so they are saying what we really need to do is reform legal immigration to where we could get an answer within a year. i was recently with that group and know there were people who were either friends or here without documentation. i just put out a question, how many of you here know somebody

without papers? and almost every one of them raise theodore hands. >> if those here how many would have accepted no if they could have got it wan reasonable time? almost all the hands went up. but they feel foolish because if they are waiting 18 years and see their neighbor pay $5,000, come here and are back home before they ever got an nswer, that's the piece that -- host: one is saying he could support a path to citizenship for illegal immigrants. nationwide this associated press piece this morning they reported he like the so-called group called the gang of eight wants to secure the border first then in year two of his plan, legal immigrants would be issued temporary visas would

have to wait in line before oving forward. high-tech visas would be panded for special entrepreneurs. guest: who would not want to come here and work in the country and get to the front of the line? i'm just saying you will never secure the border if you don't separate people wanting to improv things for your family who is going to work and wait in their country when others are not. if we can't relieve that pressure off the border, we're never going to secure it. host: known washington, d.c., democratic caller. go ahead.

caller: good morning representative and good morning. caller: it seems almost as though we are trying to sell citizenships. and off problem with it. when you come in this country, you should love this country. are you still there? host: yes. we are listening. caller: you should love this country and willing to live for it and die for it. but we are letting people come here to make money and go back home? many say i work here so i can get enough money, go back home, build my house and that's it. that's a big problem. something has to -- we have to .ook at it a little bit guest: i talk to people in town halls and i hear the same thing. i am not here to get a

citizenship. i just came here to get self-sufficient as i. one described that as being able to buy a cow and a get to so they could provide for their kids back home. the man that's managing the dairy for my friend, he has been here since 1986 and still hasn't applied for citizenship. i don't think i agree exactly with the caller saying we're trying to sell citizenship to the country but i do believe people who come here should have an allegiance to their country. host: democratic caller. caller: i'm a 47-year-old african-american, and jumping from like if you recall last year that what mitt romney, while he was running was trying to sell white conservatives to

african-americans when he spoke before the naacp. and i wanted to ask the congressman that somehow through this effort somehow white conservatives could relate to people of color. i doubt that him go-around would try to sell the idea of conservatives to -- black -- ervatives to guest: the conservative elements don't just stop with the whites or blacks or anyone. again, i think my main job so represent my constituents and in doing that, if i talk to everyone, i find that it's not so much about policies, philosophies, and theologies,

it's trying to understand what people's problems are today and seeing if we can work our way through them, that to me seems to be more compelling than being in a philosophical drive. again, my district is 34% republicans so we have a broad base. i think one of the most important things we can do is balance out those voters in every district that 70% districts they are never going to have to work very hard. i have to work very hard, and frankly i like that. and i think that's what we are called to do. not just here, these are my policies and now i need to convince you all to believe them. i have to get out there. host: how many miles do you log a year guest: pretty close to 100,000. and that's really in one car but we don't track three or

four cars over a time period and it takes nine hours to get back in the district when i leave here. host: so that's 100,000 miles a year? >> yes. guest: so we go home on three-day weekends and generally make about 1,000 miles, do 20 events. and the 10-day brakes are closer to 5,000 miles. host: what's the breakdown of hispanic voters? guest: 52%. we got 42% and mitt romney was at 22%. we kept, like the article said, we started engaging hispanic voters. they just want to know you care the issues that face them. host: you say you have been

kept out of immigration talks that the speaker john boehner has kept you out of those talks. guest: yes, i don't complain much. i just take my lot in life. i am not in the talks but as the only republican on the southern border it seems like at some point we would be there. i basically don't ask those kinds of questions of our leadership. host: "the wall street journal" says is it due to the fact that you voted against the speaker for re-election? guest: i would sppt so but i didn't even talk to staff prior to casting my vote. they are very internal things for me to try to figure out the best possible course going forward to me. host: why did you vote against him? caller: as a catcher in

that l i told the coach on so is not throwing the host: what issues specifically? guest: debt and deficit. i voted against the solution for the fiscal cliff because the headlines would say the fiscal cliff is avoided, and there were three elements. we did not avoid any of them. we raise taxes on every american. we put sequestration down the road and we did zero on deficit problems. we are facing total economic chaos if we are not careful. host: republican caller.

pennsylvania. caller: in response to the fiscal cliff, i find him very -- i do not know, i do not believe what he is saying. he is talking about a fiscal cliff, but you want us to accept the people here illegally and give them something they have not earned. i do not understand what republicans are doing. i am a conservative. i do not want amnesty. i do not want them here. host: you might have missed what the congressman said earlier. i will let him respond. guest: what she is saying is she does not want amnesty, and under president bush he had a strong amnesty plan and i said i would not back it.

total amnesty like the one president reagan did will cause a lot of problems here and i think we need the workers. obviously, a lot of people are working, and if they are paying their taxes, anger goes down. if they are getting protections that workers receive who are working here legally, then there is anger. i would separate the people who are here into two categories. one would be the green card pipeline, meaning you stay on that avenue, and the workers would be the red card avenue. you cannot jump between the green and the red pipelines. if you choose to be a worker, you processed through the border likely, you can go to the employer and a -- and they

can't see that you are legal. right now they cannot tell if they have a legitimate green card. that is the way i would move forward. broad amnesty is something i find it difficult. nnie, your thoughts? caller: we have laws that we do not follow, and you are trying to force us to go with your decision. i saw the same thing yesterday, cutting people off who did not agree. why do we cater to people who break the law in the first place? if you need the votes, i do not think you need them that badly. it upsets me terribly that we are being forced, no matter how you look at it, to except

coming-- except people here who do not love this country, and are not being politically and religiously persecuted summerhouse. host: she believes it is inevitable, a pathway to citizenship. not necessarily. if you separate the streams, the red card from the green card, i do not see where it would be inevitable. some would choose to stay part of the workforce. she is saying we do not have enough jobs for them right now, and i would just say every day we have a job fairs and every day i hear employers tell me i cannot find workers with eight percent unemployment. host: what kind of jobs? guest: every kind, management, to low worker.

if you drive a truck in an oilfield you can make $100,000 a year driving a truck with a ged. these are not low-paying jobs. we had 14 jobs at one company for over $100,000 a year and could not find a taker. ie day after the election all ofhundred jobs, $100,000 or more, so the soldiers coming back, had opportunities. these were jobs that were ready to go. i know there are areas of the but there areling

a lot of jobs out there. host: bob, california. democratic caller. caller: on your statement about truckers, trucker jobs are not like they used to be in the 1940's. now, they have a lot of knowledge that they have to have. it is not as easy as it was in the past. as far as people coming in from mexico, we should have enforced laws when they were coming in and taking care of those people that gave them jobs. that attracted them. there are not as many now. jobs here. there are economy is getting a little better down there. guest: the jobs in the trucks, these are oilfield trucks. if you do not have the commercial drivers license, some companies will put you on the dirt roads and when you get to pavement they will have another empty truck and trade off. people will do a lot to make these jobs available. if you need training, they will give you training.

again, the frustration that bob was talking about, we have laws that say people should follow the rules to come here and we have not enforce them. angry on the street are not angry but there are a lot of jobs out there. host: at the immigrants who are trying to feed their families. they are angry at the government that continues to push the question aside and not figure out how to secure the border and regulate the flow of traffic. back on the immigration question, everybody says we have to secure the border first. then they said the border is already secure. that raises the question. that is one reason i took the "wall street journal" reporter along the border and he heard the same thing -- we are still frightened, we still see people 's.h ak 47

how do you resolve that? there is one objective way to the border is secure. if the price of the illegal drugs is skyrocketing, you will notice secure. it is theonstant, same as two years ago, which tells me that with all the information we are getting that the border is no more secure than it was before. before wed cause us , we into this to say wait are just assuming the border is secure other than cash and other than government reports there is no evidence to say it than the other government reports there is no evidence to say it is. here is what rants previous had to say about the

gop. >> the report notes are the way we communicating principles is out of touch. we were described as narrowminded, out of touch and "stuffy, old men." --t: congressman? guest: understood? he was probably talking about me. the point is we put people out there that do not communicate the conservative message very well. when i came out of the debate or and the democratic senator said the thing that gives me pause is i have never heard the

conservative message of taxation presented the way you presented here today and you made me think about it. is talking about the words we use and i talking about being in front of groups we do not usually talk to. you really have to dissect the message. just a couple of weeks ago i was at a town hall meeting and the local democratic party chair was there, she left and our staff are caught her on the way out the door. she said i do not agree with all i agreeolicies but with what he is saying and how

he is saying it. so, again it is articulation in front of audiences we typically do not go to. host: bill king on twitter -- how can you reach out to women are trying to outdo each other to make the most ?estrictive abortion laws guest: there are women that favor abortion and those that favor the light side of the question. we have developed a series of women's focus groups talking not in traditional terms. we have democrat, republican and independent women air. i want to use your -- women here. toant to use your expertise change how we are even talking about these things and change the solutions. washington is not going to come to i agree with what he is saying and how he is saying it new mexico to se problems. what can we do in this community? those conversations have skyrocketed. the idea of self-determination but weng and powerful,

washington want to run home and tell people i am going to fix it. people every day if you want me to fix the problems, it is not going to happen. washington will not change your life. how can we change lives here? what can we do locally? one company is providing a nurse to check blood pressure so that we catch things up front -- more preventivemessage -- medicine. until communities start people u want me to fix the problems, it is not going to happen. solving issues, the bigger issues in washington become irrelevant. host: richard, lake placid, florida. .aller: good morning, greta good morning, representative. i would love to see c-span do a

segment on why homeland security is ordering such live ammunition. 1.6 barrels -- million barrels. they rarely shoot their guns. also, the small tanks. is there something the public does not know about? getuld like to see c-span someone to explain why the administration needs all of this ammunition and weapons. but, representative steve pearce, the gop needs to reach out to the voter called conservative. the last time they did anything with the midterm elections in 2010 when the tea party put all in midterm congressman

office and in control of the house. it seems to me that the gop is protége of thee democratic party -- big government, more spending. i think that richard is hitting a court that is very vibrant. the everyday working man or woman that raises their family corrected feels abandoned right now. the conservative values of balancing your budget at home should be extended to the government. we cannot continue to spend money we do not have, to borrow from china, to print money. the federal reserve is printing about 60% of last year's

deficit. the year before it was 70%. people are alarmed that we are basicsng the basis -- of conservatism, living within our means. we must be talking to the voters and richard has a point. it is one of the reasons you see a few of us in the house standing strong on issues of the budget, and the deficit, sequestration or whatever. host: peter. connecticut. democratic caller. -- caller: yes, rarely do i hear a republican congressman steve pearce, but it seems there is one dark spot in his thinking and the last caller brought it up. isaac newton gave us something

to think about -- physics, but you would never be able to build an atomic bomb or reactor without the 20th century einstein. at the same time as newton we had adam smith who laid out the fundamentals of economics. even smith knew there was a difference between nationstates, families and companies. in the 20th century we had john laidrd keynes, who really out the theory in practice that has been proved for 80 years or so that government must spend to get us out of the whole. .- hole the idea that we need to balance the federal budget every year is totally absurd. can he talk reasonably about the difference between the government and my family?

does he know anything about macroeconomics? guest: i appreciate the opening complements, a cousin i think the country needs democrats and republicans talking together. that is more important than anything else we should be doing. are looking at europe, far asuntry, as keynesian economics, you see a process of failure. my wife and i have a small business. we grew it about tenfold in the 10 years that we had it. sometimes we would slide -- slide into debt and pay it off. businessthe idea that you can pt to solve the problems of the deficit, it is not working. look at argentina. 100 years ago they exceeded the u.s.. they were the number two economy

in the world, and they chose a stronger government, and two years ago they had an inflation ate of 1500%. that is when you start with a hundred $50,000 and it is worth 10,000 at the end of the year. the same thing is going on with cyprus right now. money is actually taking money out of to people's savings account, depreciating our ability to pay bills and then we get into the whole idea of the wage price spiral. we are starting to see conversations on minimum wage. i think peter and i could come and -- we typically think we are far apart, and there are some areas we do not agree on, but let's close the gap down. i think we could come to a conclusion. >> a couple of immigration tweets.

how do you feel about the dream act? guest: i voted against it. it was extremely unfair. it was set up that you would get in-state tuition no matter where you want to go. if you came through normal challenges -- channels, you would have to pay out-of-state tuition. hispanic families that have been in this country for years, you cannot go from new mexico to new york and get out-of-state tuition. i am sympathetic to the people that are brought here at an early age. they are basically american citizens. i met with a group of them in new mexico and my comment to them was you figure out how to stop this from for -- pushing forward and being the same problem 20 years from now, then i am extremely interested in solving the problem, but to go

and every few years legalize them just to say we have this problem, we will give you citizenship -- that increases the pressure. in my mind everything comes to the question, how do you stop pressure on the border? living on the border, you have theiles that is open all way to arizona and we get a lot of traffic is just steps across the fence. stop the desire to walk across that area and come through is one that the voters in the second district of new mexico are concerned with. host: vivian on twitter wants to go back to comments on a guestworker -- why is it different giving legal status and giving a guestworker visa question mark why would both have a path to citizenship if

they want it? guest: if you want to be a citizen and you have to wait 20 or youithout jobs, could come here you legally, get across the border and work here for the 18 or 20 years your friends are waiting over there, who would not want to come here and do that? wet is the whole question of cannot secure the border when people are trying to feed their families. i am sympathetic to people that are starving and want a better lot for their families, but if you give them at least to citizenship, everybody would -- if you want to give them pathways to citizenship, everybody would come here. the people crossing the border checkpoints,e main

everybody on these unprotected experiences doing in the low things, guns, drugs, smuggling humans -- it is easier to enforce when people are trying to do illegal things. when you have a stream of people coming just for that things things for their family ,longside the drug smuggler again, it is pragmatism that drives my position. host: independent caller. christine. michigan. caller: good morning. i want to talk about immigration. i came from germany any years ago and we had to have a sponsor -- many yearsy ago, and we had to have a sponsor in this country, a job waiting, and we had to learn english and american government. -- i every kind of a job

picked fruit, i work in canneries, i scrubbed floors -- anything and everything to keep our family going. there were five of us that came over. we bought a house and we went to work. it was thrilling to be in this country because we were very poor in germany and we did anything and everything to be able to stay here legally. i do not understand this. people in government keeps saying we do not have enough people to do these jobs. i did them, i did not suffer for it and it made me a better person. isst: again, christine talking about a time when a lot of people, even the hispanics and i have this frequently, can we not go back to the programs where if you came here you had to have somebody that was going to hire you, and once you do

not have a job you can go back and fourth pretty easy? that has a lot of appeal. the idea that people would come here and do anything -- that is the community that i grew up in. my father was on the bottom end having been ald, dryland farmer when i was born. he went broke doing that and they were trying to feed the family. we lived outside of the town. the poor people of the town lived out there, and we all did the same thing. i started my first job at nine, working out in the fields. 10 in the working at town because you could get better pay their. six kids in the family, all of us raise the same. we share a similar background, but i am telling you that i hear employers every day in new mexico, 8% unemployment, saying

we cannot find workers. host: on twitter, do other countries take in proportionally as many legal immigrants as the united states does? how long does it take in those countries? guest: i do not know the exact answer but i know that immigration is much less in other countries than it is here. april are coming to grips with having -- people are coming to grips with having only so many jobs. look at the math on the reagan era. they thought there were one million people we were going to give citizenship to, and that is a pragmatic approach. instead of one, they processed 3.5. each one of them brought five. it was 15 million people when the government thought it was one million people.

today there is 11. if we do the expansion, there is 33. you are talking about 150 million people. we do not have 150 million jobs. that means unemployment, welfare, that will skyrocket. so the budget we are already wrestling with has the potential to get much worse. that is one reason why everybody that is worried about the deficit is saying let's slow down, figure out how many we can have in the country. host: robert, mount vernon, illinois. there isy comment is a so much work why do we have so many people on welfare and what is going to happen when we let people into our country when they do become citizens, that they are not going to turn around and go on welfare?

guest: that is exactly what one of my friends who is constantly is saying. workers his point is you have people that become legal and go on unemployment. he thinks we will see workers either operate from the system. i do not know if he is right, but robert is talking about something we should be thinking about. , in tampa, florida, independent caller. caller: this outreach to minorities -- i am wondering why we do not do outreach to the midwest and the northeast, there is an over majority of white voters. why are these white voters not voting republican? why do not -- do they not explain to them in the

northeast and the midwest that their states will end up like california and these other states -- like illinois. i am curious why these white voters in these sections of the country vote democrat. guest: i do not know if i can answer that. it addresses my first comment that in my opinion it is not so much outreach. outreach means i am going to come out and convince you to vote for me. if i just simply do my job, go to the community that i represent and do my job, people will say i either like the job he is doing or i do not. we seldom break into a campaign publicly, and that in itself is the most compelling campaign. idea of outreach -- if we start managing the business in terms of outreach, then you have

to go to his question. my point is if we are simply trying to make things better for our communities we would be presenting ideas for these voters in the midwest. of the country that are over taxing, california is finding that exodus -- we have to live with fiscal restraint. you cannot continue running deficits. i think it was either earlier who wanted to -- peter earlier who wanted to wrestle with this , we cannot keep running deficits without regard. , federal government, we all have to pay the bills. host: what about on the national stage? here is jewelry maker j. she says i feel the democrats defined stance on women and we did not recover from that. guest: we did not articulate

our positions very well on the life issue. there are many pro-life women and many that feel it is an intrusion. in the last election we had candidates that did not engage in that allows the other side to explain where you stand. when you are not willing to give an explanation, the other side will gladly explain for you, and that is what your is talkingmitter about. host: robert. independent here. know whenwant to congress and the house of representatives is going to come down and do their jobs. i am proud to be an american. i am a vietnam veteran. it is getting to the point where i am really getting disgusted with being an american

because they cannot do anything about their job. all they do is argue that i would like for them to settle down and start doing their job. they wait until the last minute to do anything. guest: robert is explaining as most frequent thing i hear -- why can you not work together, and there are basically two answers. americans elect people who look just like they do. if we are not talking in washington, you are electing us, and i asked how many of you have talked with members of the other party about difficult issues and most of the time the answer is we do not do that. when america on the streets starts to talk about the issues back-and-forth, we will do it here. that does not excuse us. i am making a point now to get the credit friends and go off- campus -- i choose people really

far away from the -- let's go, said off-campus, have dinner and talk. it is amazing how close we come. even in my district we begin talking immigration, and we closed the gap tremendously. tea party in and sat them down in 2010 or so lulac and we- with found lulac was more conservative. -- conservative on some things. houston, texas, republican. part of the problem with immigration from mexico is

mexico is a war zone. people are not safe in the government is crooked. we use that trade agreement awaiting not deal with people that violate civil rights. exit code needs to clean their act up and they need to be -- mexico needs to clean their act up and they need to be put into a position where they have to help to clean up the border. .uest: debbie is right mexico has tremendous internal problems and i go into el paso, where people are talking with people that go in the car -- go across the border, and i am hearing from mexican citizens that they are trying to clean up the mess in their country. that would stabilize it. trade from the u.s. to mexico is on the uptake right now, so there are positive things happening, but it is an unstable

region. host: a quick question about gun control -- the new york -- the "new york times" this morning saying that the colorado governor as a long path to gun limits. as the cochair of the western falcon -- caucus, what do you make of a western state governor looking like he will sign pieces of legislation? guest: i try to be german not to -- driven by not what will catch the voters, but by principle. the 1994 to 2004 they had assault rifle ban, the multiple round clip and, in the cdc took a look and could not find anything. the department of justice tried to find out if it helped and it did not.

most of america does not have a problem with guns. 67% of the violence is coming from 50 cities. if we want to clear the problem we have to go where the gains and the drugs are to clean up the messes, and that is where the violence begins to go down. , republicanpearce of new mexico, thank you for talking to our viewers. mexico across the aisle and talk to democrat earl blumenauer of oregon. later, the impact female senators are having on military policy. first, a news -- news update from c-span radio. 's new leader says he wants strong ties with washington, meeting today in beijing with treasury secretary jack lew. talks will include north korea, china's monetary policy and

cyber spying. a report from syria until information minister says chemical weapons fired by rebels in the north of the country is the first act of the opposition government announced in instant both. the ammunition was fired from aleppo. the day before president obama leaves for the middle east he will mark his 5th street patrick's day in the white house with a schedule of irish-themed events including meeting with the irish prime minister and then an annual luncheon. aner on they will have evening reception where the president will receive a bowl of shamrocks in a tradition started under harry truman. ago today we begin providing televised access to the everyday workings of congress and the federal government.

, created byetworks america's cable companies in 1979 and brought to you as a service by your television provider. >> the winners have been selected in the student can documentary competition on the theme "your message to the president." the winner was josh stokes on unemployment. won first prize. and a group one for a documentary on public transportation. watch the winning videos each day next month on c-span and see all the documentaries at studentcam.org. "washington journal" continues.

host: we are back with earl blumenauer, and the representative from oregon. he sits on the ways and means committee. yesterday, the headline from "the hill." opinion piece an in "the wall street journal" by ew economist economist to say how the house republican budget would boost the economy because it slows spending. "according to our research,

host: congressman? , the: and first of all budget itself, as i said yesterday, it is fantasyland. it is predicated on the peeling obamacare. you may recall, we had and election and this was the main argument against the president. voters decided. they reelected a president. they elected more democrats to the senate and democrats in the house got one million more votes than republicans. the republican budget has the same approach to taxation. toy are going to lower taxes they will bee, and magically doing this and be but theeutral,

republicans cannot explain explain how to do that without dramatically increasing taxes on the middle class, and the reason they did not do that is because you can not do that without raising taxes on the middle class. they will increase defense spending when everybody understands we have to scale down and reposition the defense budget. it is a hopeless mismatch. it would not stimulate the economy. look at what is happening in great burden -- great written .ith the austerity kick how is that working out? we have had greater economic growth. quote all you want from "the wall street journal" the house they aret what talking about not only is not going to happen, but it should not.

host: it is the beginning of the process, the bill comes to the fore for voting this week -- to the floor for voting this week and president obama hoping for a grand bargain. here is the headline with president obama telling the credits it is better to make changes when a democrat is in office rather than risk doing so under a republican chief executive. guest: i have felt it was possible to change the way we do is this and that is why i voted against the new year's eve deal. it was not enough. it was not bold, it did not change anything and it created three fiscal cliff's for a amount of revenue recaptured. i am open to being able to make changes. in fact, if we accelerate the health care reform that has

already been improved rather than pretend like we are going to abolish it, there are opportunities for us to dramatically reduce expenditures in the out years. i come from a state that is working to accelerate that reform. that $1.9ment has billion that we can meet our promise of reducing the rate of increase 2% a year and maintain the quality standards. these are the things we should be working on rather than fairyland budgeting and talking past each other. let's see if we can actually make the changes rather than throwing rocks at each other. the hill" newspaper about the proposal --

what do the house democrats say on changing medicare and/or social security? , socialirst of all security does not affect the deficit. by law, social security is self- contained and we have 25 years when we have to make changes. i agree that we should. trying to mix this up in the budget discussion is irrelevant. it will not deal with balancing our challenges for a sustainable fiscal future with the federal budget over the next couple of years, although i would be happy to see us spend time working with the american public to deal with what they would like to do to bring it to balance over the long term. toust mentioned, being able accelerate the reforms the in the affordable care act is the to bring down

spending, not shoving the responsibility off on the disabled and elderly with a voucher. that is a prescription for disaster. the american public rejected it last november and they should have. there are better ways to deal with that problem. host: what about a change to cpi, a change to the formula formula for calculating cost-of- living adjustments? socialas i said, and security should be separated out, but i have no problem with adjusting some of the medicare in the out years for wealthier recipients to maybe not get quite as much. have a little more than they pay. but, you have to be very -- the, and this is very point that the president made when he talked to us that is

lost on some commentators -- a change cpi without dealing with compounding effect for seniors 90, can see be 85, a dramatic reduction in their benefits, and older people, in some cases have more expenses rather than younger people. host: what was the reaction when the president said it was better to change under a democratic president? ofst: it was in the context a broader conversation and the president said he wants us to move forward and he acknowledged that there were problems if you did not deal with low and moderate-income people. it was a nuanced statement, and he was saying you ought to be willing to look at it. he was not committing to a specific, and he acknowledged the concerns that politics have

been that i share. host: mickey, kentucky. caller: i wanted to asked the representative why democratic representatives are not asking republicans -- republicans are always saying they have to balance the budget, do this -- the any reforms american people have to run a household with a balanced budget, and that is not true. we have car payments, we have house payment. stuff like that. i would like to know why they do not remind republicans that people do not have a balanced budget at home. guest: the caller is making an important point. most of us have a home mortgage. any of us have credit card debt

or student loans, investments that we think will pay off over time. also, the federal government is different from a household. when a household income shrinks, we make adjustments justifiably. sometimes when the federal shrinks its budget is exactly the time the federal government should be spending more. for example, on unemployment and food stamps and the federal government has a responsibility for dealing with people in tough times. if we cut back on unemployment and food stamps when the bottom fell out of the economy, we still would be falling. that is what we did in great britain to ill effect but we do not want to confuse the principles. we want the federal government to be sustainable. we will obviously pay our bills. some of our republican friends friend that we -- threat that we

will not the but there is a responsibility in tough times. host: at. in south carolina. caller: good morning. you keep saying the democrats are out to protect the middle class. i have heard that so much, i am sick of it. when obamacare comes into effect, we will be taxed on medical equipment. there are more taxes in obamacare, and you all are hiding it. i explained that one. guest: actually, the recommendation and it -- that was enacted into law was that there would be increases. you will not get something for nothing, that for the vast

majority of people the benefits of having approximately 30 more million -- 30 million more people getting health care, and the subsidies available for lower and middle come taxpayers to even it out, and the benefit of not having lifetime limits on health insurance, or being denied insurance because of preakness -- pre-existing conditions -- that is a very cruel tax on the american public. the stories we have heard about people that cannot get health care, or that half of bankruptcies are from medical cost -- something that does not happen anyplace else in the world -- the balance makes sense. it is one that i voted for. i thought it was the right thing to do. i think the american public, on balance, will be getting a good feel. host: terry, tacoma, washington.

independent caller. toler: i just want to say havemericans out there, we to stop the democrats and republicans. we are all in this thing together. i wanted to straighten out the senator there. earlier, he said i am tired of the democrats saying we got elected, one million people elected us into office, we are doing what the public wants. when mr. obama was running for office, he promised there would not be taxes raised on anyone below $250,000. he promised there would not be a sequester. he promised he would immediately sign through the canadian oil pipeline. he has done none of those. we might have liked what he was promising.

guest: actually, your caller is .istaking -- mistaken i am aware of nothing where the president said he would sign into law the keystone pipeline. he talked about making a decision in a timely fashion, but i do not think that was a commitment. the president has actually been rather aggressive in making sure he did not increase taxes on people that made under $250,000. he did not say he would raise taxes on people that made over that. ironically, the taxes were sent to expire under the bush tax cuts, so those were scheduled to go away. that is what the republicans passed 12 years ago. the only tax that increase was a temporary tax that was relief given to reduce the payroll tax to try to give a shot in the arm to the economy.

that was always designed to be a temporary tax. as a practical matter, the president has, in fact, kept his pledge. it is ironic. polls show the american people thought that with the american recovery act that their taxes increase when, in fact, 94% of the people saw a reduction. what the president promised, he did, but a lot of people did not understand it and thought their taxes increased. people that look at the facts understand that they have received tax reductions. i personally think we have gone a little overboard. we will have to rebalance the scales, but the president kept his promises on taxation, notwithstanding what you're caller said. you're caller is wrong.

beach on twitter says the private sector will always be a better fiscal that the anything run by the government -- fact, says this person. we are talking about the budget with earl blumenauer as the house begins work on the budget put out by paul ryan last week. "the hill" reports this morning that the republicans in the house had enough votes on their own to pass this, and senate democrats have enough votes to pass their budget in that chamber. we'll go to sean in portland, connecticut. guest: portland, connecticut? host: portland, connecticut, is that right? , portland, connecticut. not portland, maine, or oregon. to me, as an independent, .verything boils down to money

you have republicans that cater to upper middle-class class and wealthy people, and democrats to lower middle class and poor people, and as long as there is that division and will be a fight over money. we have a 100-year-old tax code. how come you do not talk about changing the tax code so that it is fair to everyone and then you are not fighting over tax increases? makes ane caller important point about tax reform. thatis actually one thing republicans and democrats do agree on. the tax code has grown into an unwieldy monster. it costs us over 160 billion dollars a year just to comply with it. we give away more money in tax actually collect in net revenue to the federal government, and it is

hopelessly unfair along with the complex. i do think there are opportunities for us to have some bipartisan support to make some changes. i am working on the ways and means committee as part of working groups where people on both the democratic and republican sides are meeting in informal groups. we had a fascinating yesterday g with ways to make the corporate tax work better. we have the highest statutory corporate tax rate in the world .ow, but almost nobody pays it the average tax rate is about 25%, and some corporations, famously, pay little or no corporate tax. i think there are opportunities for us to eliminate some of the corporate tax deductions, loopholes, if you will.

you could lower the tax and make it work better. those are areas of bipartisan cooperation. one of the things you have to do with the individual tax is see if people can zero in on what it is they want the tax code to do. that is a conversation that has been long on hyperbole and short shirt sleeve, roll them up, figure out what we want. serves on blumenauer the ways and means committee and the budget committee. here is a budget question from twitter -- what is the highest level of debt we can afford in your opinion? need to do, what we is stabilize and reduce the debt burden. we are looking at 70% of gdp. the guessing that one of

things that people need to focus on is what is happening with the economy. if the economy is growing, if people are working, if we have positives going forward, then we can gradually reduce this, stabilize it over time. we have had these peaks and valleys in the past and americans have responded. part of it is investing in making sure that we renew the country. we did that after world war ii. we spent money so returning veterans could go to college and by a home. we spent money on the interstate highway system. he made investments that help make our country stronger. the american society of civil engineers came out with a report that shows we are $3.6 trillion short between now and 2020 of the needs for our infrastructure. people from around

the world are giving the federal government money, essentially paying us to keep their money as we are the safest place in the world for those investments. we ought to be able to take low interest rates, invest in rebuilding and renewing the country -- improvements that will last for 50 years. we should not be borrowing for current government operations. you need to bend that curve. grows, we the economy reform the tax code, we will be able to bring it back down from the current levels. remember, the world, some of the smartest people in the world with billions of dollars, head judge that we are an island of stability in and uncertain world. it is not like we are on the verge of becoming greece. then roush, louisiana.

republican. you are on the air. caller: i have a question for mr. blumenauer. he made the statement that the democrats won the election, but he did not tell about all the voter fraud that made them win like the voter fraud in the battleground states and the people in ohio right now that are going to jail. jim, where did you read about the fraud? ?: read about it it was all over the news. you did not say much about it, that all the voter -- battleground states had voter fraud and in ohio right now

they are having hearings on people that voted twice and six times and whatever it -- whatever. host: all right. conversely? i am afraid jim is channeling some some of the people who have made it hard for americans to vote. of rampant voter making it extraordinarily difficult for average americans to vote is fantasy. the study could only find one or two cases out of millions of votes cast. i come from a state where we do all our ballots by mail, a system that i would advocate a nationally, which would take the

air out of this balloon. i started as a young activist working on a commission for the national league of women voters and the national civic league, to have a system of elections that works better for voters. if we make it harder for our people put than virtually any other western democracy. all thesetered into different pieces,, where there are opportunities for people to make it hard for individual voters. we have seen in virginia -- i have people in my office trying to help voters where the same precincts don't have enough voting machines that did not have enough four years earlier and people were waiting outside in terrible weather. a well-tely adjacent in

off present, people were able to be inside and there were more voting machines. host: are you closely following the oral arguments yesterday in the arizona law? what president could except if the supreme court sided with arizona? this: it is going down path to make voting harder, more onerous. there are millions of people in this country that were not born in a hospital. there are millions of people that don't have a driver's license or a passport. -- instead of making sure that everybody is enrolled, which is what we should do. in other countries, everybody w ho is a citizen is entitled to vote. we turn it on its head and enable voter manipulation at the local level, by partisans in both parties. it's amazing we don't have more

problems. independent in syracuse, new york. caller: i wonder why the obama goes along with the republicans, and others in talking about how so shall security is in trouble. social security is not in trouble. it would take a minor fix, raising the caps, and social security would be fine for another 75 years. i am on social security and i live on $700 a month. y social security was raised 1.3% in january, while food has gone up 14% since the last ra ise. i don't understand it. i go to the salvation army and buy a shirt for $3 and i pay % sales tax.

one who buys $100 million worth of stocks pays no sales tax. i think that a stock transaction fee could be set specifically to balance the budget with. guest: your caller makes an important point. social security is not bankrupt. there are resources that will last for the next 25 years, although the longer we go on, we approach the point where it is not going to be self sustaining. the trust fund for social security is exhausted. we face a potential 25% reduction in social security payments. ron is right, there are a number of things that could happen that would make a difference. about $111,000, after which the social security tax is no longer collected

against and higher in calm. back when we first established social security, almost all i ncome was subjected to the social security tax. a much greater percentage of earned income that is not taxed and then there's lots of other compensation that people received the that escapes the tax altogether. so it would be possible to make adjustments that are relatively minor that would stabilize the system for a number of years. but i think this is something we ought to be having more of a national conversation. we ought to have a national save social security day and every classroom, a church, civic club within in connectio -- with an internet connection go out and do their own system.

everybody could give a little and we would stabilize it over time. this is important and is getting more important as private pensions are going away and we see how inadequate so many 401k plan are and individual savings. the person who has money in a savings account or certificate of deposit is paying a tremendous price still for bailing out the banks and trying to right the economy. there are lots of choices to fix it. the more we get on with that conversation, the better off we will be. host: in chantilly, virginia, independent. caller: good morning. i really appreciate the show and the opportunity to talk. first, something was mentioned here that makes sense. nothing is free. it will cost you something, regardless of how you look at it.

part of the problem we're grappling with its people try to compare this to the household budget. it is nowhere near that. i'm 86 and i'm not getting home alone. let's be honest. this country has no age. you depend on younger generations to pay the bill. ok? the other thing that i look at is we talk about gdp, but nobody talks about " what makes up the gdp. we want to raise the gdp. the wrong number to raise in gdp is government spending. you want to raise other areas of gdp. otherwise he winds up with a high gdp and we're talking about ratios, but it's the wrong number to raise. those are very important concepts. let me make two reactions.

not free, butre they don't have to be so expensive. that's what i would like to see us focus on in our budget debates and our policy is going forward. -- policies. health care is almost twice as expensive in the u.s. than in any of our competing countries. and their results are as good or better than the united states. they don't get sick as often, they get well faster, they live longer. experts agree that between 20% and 40% of american medical spending is wasted. that is part of what we try to get at with the health care reform and we need to be focusing on that. squeezing more value, looking at what we are doing with defense as well. two thirds of a trillion dollars over the next and here is from

the nuclear arsenal when a fraction of that nuclear arsenal could destroy a motrussia many times over and a few missiles could white north korea off the face of the earth. we need to be scaling back down and not wasting money on it. there are things we can do in the budget process that move us in these directions. why are we giving away america's mineral wealth to foreign corporations to mine for gold, for example? and there's no money paid to the taxpayer. there's lots of things we can do to reduce expenditures and be able to give more value to the taxpayer. you're not going to hear much about that in the debates to date on the republican budget. host: on twitter --

guest: there are a variety of areas that are going to be providing the subsidization. there will be, on balance, based on -- compared to what we would be spending otherwise, the health care reform is actually going to be a net savings in terms of the federal budget. the estimate originally was $100 billion for the first 10 years, and 1 trillion over the next 20 years. what the caller id norris is the spending that is a baked in. iswhat the caller ignores the spending that is baked in , that is much less efficient than the rest of the world. it will actually cost the american public less over the next 20 years. the more we get about the

business and refine it, the savings will be even greater. host: oregon, democratic caller. guest: somebody is up early. hi, representative. when in washington will get to 21st century government where we get away from this federal state but what we need as a country to form a 21st century society? , my wifeyan as budget is on social security disability. i am under 55. in terms of what you are doing as a society with the voucherization of medicare is you are splitting up families. you are creating a two-tier system. , ist: i do think, john

making a couple of sharp points. we do need to be thinking about what makes sense for this century. mining thatthe foreign corporations can mine our mineral wealth and pay nothing to us. that's because we are operating under the mining act of 1872, which is basically how it was signed into law by president grant. it is time to make changes to bring these things into this century. , whichcher approach saves the government money by limiting what it pays and in shifting the risk onto seniors and disabled is simply the wrong way to go. it is not going to happen. the president would not approve it. it will not get through

congress. and i think when the public understands what is there, they will not stand for it. host: on twitter -- it is emblematic -bove pass level bike partisanship. you have give-and-take on capitol hill. one of the things i do around the country is promotes cycling, the most efficient form of urban transportation ever designed, burning calories instead of fossil fuels. i don't know if your viewers can see some of the rental bikes outside the window here on capitol hill, which reestablished. cycling is the cheapest, fastest way to get highway capacity, get somebody out of a car in front of you and into a bike path. it is a fun and healthy eating to do. it pays to advertise. host: is this what is sparking

speculation that he might be nominated as transportation secretary? respect ray lahood. i want to stay there. host: he said that he is not. guest: but let's keep him on the job as long as we can. it?: would you take guest: i like what i'm doing. i think i can be a better advocate doing the work i do in congress and in other communities than being even a good bureaucracy with the presidents i respect. i would like to be a free agent. host: that soundsa no. no.hat sounds like a -- on gun legislation that was always going to

be a remote possibility. i think what is important is that we have seen a see change on capitol hill about the notion of a gun safety. i commend the president and vice-president for the work they've done. senator feinstein has been and given her history, her words have power that few members have. my colleague mccarthy, who was motivated to run for office because of the slaughter that she witnessed a long island rail road that claimed the life of. the fact that we're likely to get universal background checks and that people are now looking at simple, common-sense gun safety proposals is very important. auto accident the death rate in half by some magic fairy dust solution. itwas years of engineering,

was education, enforcement. the way we are going to reduce the gun carnage in this country will be working the same way with simple, common-sense steps to do all we can to reduce it. i think we're on our way. host: tim is next in boston, independent. caller: good morning. in thei could have faith democrats, but they cave all the time. if you are adamant about getting people into the middle class, the way the republicans defend the wealthy and corporations, i probably would be making $200 an hour now. anyway, i just want to make two points. i find it disgusting that a gas bag like rush limbaugh makes on average, $43,000 an hour. pay he should not have to

it any taxes on that when i pay roughly 33% of my income in taxes. and i gladly pay it. allrepublican party, that's they do is campaign on personal responsibility. and corporations are people, my friends, they say. and there's no such a thing as a free handout from the government. hold their feet to the fire and use their own rhetoric to tell them, ok, corporations are people and they need to take personal responsibility, there are no handouts. therefore, we should ask shell oil, british petroleum, exxonmobil to pick up the tab for the wars, the rebuilding, the destruction of iraq. pay for that since they are getting all the oil out of it and they are generous enough to charge us $5 a gallon for it. i wish you would bring that up to some of your republican colleagues to actually live by their own philosophy. host: congressman?

guest: i wish that we had been a little more aggressive in some of those areas. i voted against the new year's budget deal, because i thought that it was not old enough. and it is interesting watching what some of my republican colleagues did, which actually brought about the sequestration. it was clear that some of the people in the house would have willingly wrecked the global economy, defaulting on the national debt, not paying for bills that we have already incurred, and were in transgender. the president was faced with a dilemma in terms of people who would willingly take the economy hostage, the global economy hostage. it is a very strange calculation. that's why i would have wished that we would have taken a firmer stance with all these

expiring tax provisions to be able to fashion something that would been bolder, that would have solved more problems, and would not have created 3 new fiscal cliff. host: deborah in richmond, virginia, a democrat, our last caller. caller: good morning. one.k your top caller: how come medicare cannot bargain on products and services? guest: i personally think that the largest consumer of pharmaceutical products in the world, medicare, should have been able to obstruct a better deal, like we do for the veterans department, which it was able to save money. we were expanding the universe of people who were taking prescription drugs.

they stood to make a lot of money. i'd think there were ways to strike a better deal. i think it was a mistake. host: congressman earl blumenauer, democrat of oregon, thank you for talking to our viewers. guest: thank you. host: next, will turn our tentative female senators on the senate armed services committee and the impact they're having on military policy. first a news update from c-span radio. >> it's 9:20 eastern. economic news from the commerce department. they report that u.s. builders started construction of homes in february at the second fastest pace in four and a half years. deborah ground on homes at a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 917,000. rate has beenthe faster since june of 2008. that's just a few months into the great recession. it was in december. more evidence of a sustainable housing recovery. there's word this hour that there's been an explosion at a

military ammunition storage facility in the data. it happened during the marine corps training exercise and caused several fatalities. -- in nevada. armys at the hawthorne depot. the explosion was an accident. in rome, 200,000 people attended today's installation ask for pope francis in vatican city. in his homily, the new pontiff asked people to protect the environment and the poorest and the weakest. cansaid a little tenderness open up a horizon of hope. >> 34 years ago we began providing televised access to congress and the every day workings of the government. c-span, created in 1979 by america's cable companies and brought to you as a public service by your television provider.

>> the winners have been selected in this year's c-span's studentcam documentary competition on the theme "your message to the president.'' the grand prize winner was josh. first prize for his work on the economy and spending. one person prize with a documentary on transportation along with two other boys. see all the videos on our website. >> "washington journal" continues. host: merideth shiner is a staff writer for roll call. here's a headline from a recent piece -- are sixhere subcommittees and of those,

three of them are not shared by women. threedition to those p chaired by women, three of them subcommittee is chaired by women. given the history of women in politics, it's a pretty remarkable thing. the other thing they are doing, they're not just coming to the senate. these are women who want to be involved and are actively engaged. the armed services committee is a very active committee no matter what the budget situation is in this town. this is a committee that has debates and consequential debates about our international policies. three women are kirsten gillibrand, the chairwoman of the subcommittee on personnel. , the's kay hagan chairwoman for the subcommittee on emerging threats. and then there's the subcommittee chairwoman of readiness and preparedness.

these are women and elderly asserting themselves -- inserting themselves into the debate. host: there is kelly ayotte from new hampshire on the committee. clairebra fischer, jeanneill, kay hagan, gillibrand, and mazie hirono. the states they represent, what does that say? guest: with paul white e or north carolina, these are states that have a significant amount of military bases and the budgetary and personal stakes in what the military does. i think what you hear when you talk to these women is that they feel they bring something a little different to the table. i was talking with kirsten gillibrand for a story the day before the subcommittee hearing

on violence in the military that we were discussing and she said we have a bit of a del prado approach, and before we are only talking about artillery and machines, now sometimes we are asking why is there such a high incidence of ptsd and high incidence of divorce from service members returning? what are the services we're giving our veterans? so you see a much more holistic approach to some of these issues. at the same time, you're not addressing women talking about soft tissues. nothing about an emerging threat subcommittee is a soft or less substantial conversation. host: referring to the hearing you're talking about on sexual assaults in the military, recovered and hearing. i want to show our viewers what the senators had to say. that is live television for you.

that is not what we wanted to show you. we will get the video for you. here it is. [video clip] ,> i am extremely disturbed based on the last round of question and answer, that each of you believes that the convening authority is what maintains discipline and order within your ranks. if that is your view, i don't know how you can say you're having 19,000 sexual assaults and rapes per year a is discipline and order. i don't understand how you can say that of those 19,000 cases to only approximately 2400 even reported because the victim's tell us that they are afraid to report because of retaliation, and the blame they will get and the scorn there will get from their colleagues, is order and discipline. i cannot understand how 2400 cases, only 240 of which go to trial, canby resolved in your

believing that according is giving you discipline and order. it is the exact opposite of discipline and order. i am very grateful for all the changes that have been made. each of you gave opening testimony that was very strong and thoughtful about the kind of changes you are making. and i appreciate that i heard from each of you that there is zero-tolerance and i appreciate that i hear from each of you on the training you are giving your lawyers and the training you're giving your prosecutors and the training your giving or advocates. that is all well and good, but if the convening authority is the only decision maker of whether a case goes to trial or proceeds and the only decision maker about whether to overturn training andll the all the excellent lawyers and prosecutors you have a don't make a difference. host: the senator from new york. that exchange prompted this headline --

guest: guests, and obviously the conversation you saw was very passionate, but the most interesting thing i found was the senate used to be a place where those conversations were completely absent. it was most happening in the house, of which you see a little in kirsten gillibrand, came from the house, was immediately put an armed services committee by nancy pelosi and has been talking about these issues for quite some time. there's a special committee that deals wickes violence in the military -- a special caucus that deals with violence in the military. in the senate, you really did not talk about it. leon panetta, when he was talking about making changes the policy and reporting and dealing with sexual assault in a military, at that time, so that documentary is one of the main reasons he was brought to knowledge of this issue. they tried to find senators to dock on the record for the

camera in the movie and nobody would. when it's all lawmakers in the film, it was only members of the house. that is a telling sign that you are finally seeing the senate talk about it. it is clearly a significant issue. there are 19,000 cases of sexual violence in the military. the actual number that has been reported or that get prosecuted is much smaller. host: what is next for this issue in particular? guest: i think there will be a series of hearings. congress might try to weigh in in terms of trying to make so there are more staff to carry rules paramilitary has to face. right now all of the rules that have been created are basically within the department and they not been sufficient. when you look at defense authorization bill that gets passed every year, that the police or congress can issue guidance. but it's not clear they can issue a directive that would force the military to change.

likeinly, they can mandate they did with "don't ask, don't tell" in the defense authorization bill. this certified reports that would make the findings permanent, so there are things they can do. host: in other issues that come before the armed services committee, how are the female senators playing a role when it comes to bipartisanship? guest: i think that they are certainly active. it's very much a bipartisan issue in the military. we spoke earlier about kelly a. ayotte. there was john mccain, instagram, and joe lieberman and when joe lieberman retired there was the third amiga. she has a legal history and is a tough lawmaker who has latched on to these issues and made them her own. i don't know exactly what she's

planning to do with that. but it's interesting to watch because it has automatically given her a platform, on issues that get talked about. that's one of the most important things about women being involved on the committees, because we always talk about these issues. host: we're talking about the impact it's having on military policy. here's the republican from new hampshire during the committee vote on the nomination of chuck hagel to become defense secretary. >> on this nomination i'm in a very different place. i very much agree with my colleague senator harry reid and qusseir to describe the state of our country and the state of our national defense and the challenges we face around the world right now. it's a very difficult time and a dangerous time around the world. thatf the first challenges we face and one of the greatest national security threats that march of irane toward obtaining a nuclear weapon. i find myself, in reviewing

senator heard chuck hagel's record and what he said when he appeared before us in a very lengthy hearing before the committee, to be very much at odds with him on this issue and also on some of his prior positions at odds with members of both sides of the aisle. host: merideth shiner, what about her role in the nomination of chuck hagel? you see her out front on the issue and on what happens in benghazi, the attacks on the embassy? guest: this is something you saw -- i don't using as know what to college. they have been very vocal on the issue, whether it was benghazi or the nomination of chuck hagel, which eventually passed, but not without some consternation. it has been helpful for republicans to have a diversity of voices on this issue. it's not john mccain or lindsey graham talking about this.

it is someone with a different republican message although she's been different in her message. she is not diverged from what the republican conventions have been on this issue. in utah, independent caller. caller: good morning, thanks for taking my call. it is a wonderful thing to see increased diversity of panelists and female senators. week very interested last to see the female senators questioning various representatives of the armed services relative to the sexual abuse situation in the u.s. military. that is a very relevant topic that concerns all of us. briefly, senator claire mccaskill talked about the incidents of sexual abuse

against males in the u.s. military. no other individual had brought that up besides her and she only talked about it for a few seconds. it's encouraging to see that she has done that. i certainly support her in her bravery to address the subject, because i think sometimes in the , issuese that we have of abuse against males, both children and men, this is not necessarily a strictly military issue, but it needs to be addressed, due to the gender discrimination against against male victims of sexual abuse and how their cause has been explained. and i would like for people to comment on that. i'm not anti-female, but i am pro-female senators, recognizing that they do have male

constituents who do have problems. host: merideth shiner? guest: i think that claire mccaskill, some of her subcommittees' fall in a moment security domain, but she's a former prosecutor. when we talk about some of the violence issues, democrats especially have been very careful for them not to be completely narrowly tailored to women specifically appear that was one of the reasons you saw the violence of women act drag on for so long. the debate was protracted because there were increased protections for men who are in domestic relationships and being abused, whether straight or gay. you are seeing more of an umbrella of the rights being thatded.mike is right in women's purpose is not just to champion the cause of women. that was some of the voices when we talk about policy for service members, one of the things we cannot address is women will be in combat for the first time. so this is something men will

try to talk about and women will have to talk about equally, regardless of gender. host: that the front page of usa today -- the issue of allowing women into ground combat jobs such as infantry is a highly charged and emotional issue that riles politicians. been numbers of women have proving themselves physically capable four years. but the women that serve on the senate armed services committee, the female senators, what do they say about this issue? guest: they are reserving judgment. because is new. it is a decision that was made when former defense secretary leon panetta was leaving office. they don't really know what the consequences of this will be. interesting point that kirsten

gillibrand makes is she believes it's entirely possible? but the presence of women in combat will reduce the number of sexual assaults, because there will be women involved in every element of the military and because their presence will become more commonplace. i don't know whether that is true. time will tell. i think you'll see the panel, whether it is female senators or mail centers really asking the tough questions. -- or male senators. because the women were kept out of these positions for so long, they tend to do their homework and they tend to ask really tough questions. claire mccaskill pointed out something that no one else had. these are women coming prepared to ask the right questions, but they don't know what questions they will have to ask host: yet we're talking about female senators on the armed services committee and their impact on policy. we want to hear from you.

tom comeng to go to a republican caller. i want to go through the female house members on the armed services committee. go ahead. caller: good morning, c-span. when can we expect these militant feminists like obama or any of these feminists in the senate to demand that all the women at west point meet the identical standards that the men are required to meet. the standards for the women are substantially lower. if the women were required to meet the same standards, the majority of the women at west point would be expelled immediately for failure to meet that standard. i would expect all those militant tamil -- militant feminists in the senate to demand that they meet the same standards. that as do know part of a conversation of allowing women to be in combat,

they have to meet the same physical standards as men do. is for everyone's safety. so women would be able to carry out the same physical tasks. whether or not that leads to a larger percentage of women, regardless of gender, it's very difficult to meet the kind of standards required for our military. i don't know that there's a higher percentage of women that will be able to meet those standards. but i do a thing because the opportunity is afforded to them, there will be more people who will try. host: this system "usa today" --

also from "usa today" -- you can go to our website c- span.org if you want to watch the whole interview. bill is in wellington, kansas. caller: and just wanted to talk about the violence against women in the military not being reported or prosecuted. i really believe it is probably a direct reflection hope what goes on in many states, whether

it is a billion or otherwise. i would think that the senator should maybe want to take a look at her state and see how many rapes are going on. and how much is being on the other statements i want to make is a, while women are being allowed into combat, i have heard no one discuss females being mandated to register for the draft. you cannot pick and choose those things in the military that you want to do and then exclude yourself from others, which typically happens when you have women requesting or being in positions to make those decisions. point,on the first sexual assault is an issue whether it is a billion a military that the senators are concerned about. -- whether it is civilian or military. , what is soassaults

concerning to some of the senators was how the reporting process was configured and how the really lowered incidence of reporting, because there was really no independent body that was looking into these cases. you would have to report them to a superior, who usually oversaw both you and your assailant. i think there was a serious issue in the infrastructure of the reporting system. that was one of the particular concerns of lawmakers in washington. the second point, that was interesting, the idea of allowing women in combat but we're not forcing them to enter the draft. that is a conversation that i don't know if we will have until we need a draft again, probably. i would imagine that just based on the amount of people who would be physically qualified to do this who our men and women, there would be a pretty large discrepancy in that still. so i don't know whether you

could require women to do this and have them meet the qualification of serving in combat. host: on twitter -- david in iowa, independent. caller: hello. host: go-ahead. the speaker makes convinced that there are really gender differences with regard to how a senator votes or their orientation with regard to being more progressive, more liberal, more conservative on these issues? it seems to me that women are just as likely to take a more conservative positions. femaleknow that a

senator or not is going to make a significant difference in their orientation on the policies? guest: that's a valid question. we spoke about kelly ayotte. she has had very different opinions from kirsten gillibrand. if you are republican, you will hold more republican values. if you are democrat, you will hold more democratic values. the point of the story is their approach to talking about some of these issues is different. a lot of times in these committees you are talking about more bipartisan issues and the difference between the parties is a bit more narrow. you are right in saying a woman would not be just elected to the senate and hold women's views. there's no such a thing as a monolithic view held by a woman. the point is just that because there's an increased presence of women, everyone brings their personal experience to the table when talking about issues. obviously, a woman's personal experience might be different than a man's, so that might inspire them to act different

predict ask a different question. but i don't think there's a distance between a republican woman or republican man. if anything, geography might make more of a difference or what the composition of their state is. host: you can decide for yourself if the female senators are asking different types of questions. recovering a hearing before the senate armed services committee on c-span.org. regional commanders are testifying about the 2014 defense requests, what they are going to need as far as resources and money. if you have a computer in front of you right , to hearan.org testimony, and senators on the panel talking about military policy. there are six senators -- or seven female senators that serve on the armed services committee. guest: i think that's right. host: here's the list. michigan, independent.

medic in was a combat vietnam for two gtours. one of the biggest grievances i had with the military was put people into combat that were not ready or capable of dealing with combat. , that's why we lost a lot of people. there's a lot of vietnam veterans that had serious guilt problems because they did not perform properly in combat and they carry that with them. before,ry destructive after, and during combat. to all of a sudden push people, male or female, in this position -- let me be blunt. vietnam veterans know

what i'm talking about. they used to give you all kopp because they did not know how they would respond until everything hit the fan of a sudden. some people with panic, some people would duck. we want to find out who he is and what he's like. to put women through that, especially women that have emotional issues, will pay freeze our free out? -- freak out? why would like to see -- there are people who are meant to kill. host: if men reacted that way, then what's the difference between having women react that way? caller: this is what i'm trying to get to. you don't know until all of a sudden you get in the middle of it. i will refer in this to any

police officer who has ever been in a gunfight. you don't know what that person next to you is going to do until the threat level hits. they may panic or do anything. on twitter -- any thoughts? guest: i think you are seeing an increased presence of women in leadership positions. we just named our first female head of the air force academy. it's because women are getting increased opportunity at lower levels and are able to rise to these ranks. that's an interesting point is that if you don't have women in combat, that might be held against them if they're looking to rise into leadership positions. host: in south carolina, chad. caller: i don't think there's any difference as far as decision making between male senators and female senators.

as far as policymaking, they will go whichever way the wind blows, depending on public opinion. i would like to comment on women in the military. great that women are finally getting the opportunity to serve in full combat positions. the whole debate is laughable. if you look at history, in world war ii, women were serving on the frontlines in the soviet union against germany and really without their presence we would not have won the war. that's a simple fact. anybody who knows history would know that. it amazes me that these guys serving on the armed services committee don't bother looking at the presence of women in combat in the past. host: on twitter --

guest: that's right. you would not say that all men think the same just because they are men. think it's important for different kinds of voices to be because these issues, they asked different sorts of questions and because its important for the women get elected to congress to assert themselves, to build a power base, to get every opportunity male senators to. otherwise what's the point of having women senators if they will not have an equal voice? when someone like kelly ayotte gets to the forefront of some of these issues, whether or not democratic colleagues agree, is still important for that presence to be growing. host: jackie in california, a democrat. caller: good morning. thank you for c-span,. inas in the marine corps 1967 during the vietnam era.

most are much tougher than men and give them credit for being. there was a caller just on who was talking about people who could not kill or do what they needed to do in the combat zone. he is totally wrong. men and women go through the duringnds of feelings those particular times. however, if you went through boot camp in the united states marine corps, you went through the crucible. there's no way that you're not point to be as tough if not tougher than men are. women need to be in the senate, because they bring a very different perspective, a much different perspective. we are tougher than men and give us credit for being. thank you. guest: i think jackie makes an interesting point. the building behind you has been dominated by men for years, whether it was at the member

level or the staff level. when women and up being senators have faced discrimination their entire careers. the idea that they will not be as tough a prosecutor or senator. that way if they can emphasize areas when people say women cannot be as tough in the military. women can be as tough or as cutthroat as their male counterparts. host: jackie? caller: it's the truth. i don't think there's much more i need to say. i have been married to a marine combat veteran for 45 years. agent sprayed on with orange sandy's been through -- agent orange and he has been th rough heck. if it were not for me, he would not be here. women bring a very different perspective, no matter what the

committee we are on, no matter what elected position we hold, no matter whether we are little workers in a company, or the ceo of a company, or in the senate or as a representative, there's a different perspective women bring and men need to recognize that we are intelligent, strong, brave, true. do you want to see from congressman or from the pentagon when it comes to women playing a combat role? what do women need to be successful in those roles? caller: they just need to be treated equally. we can shoot. we used to have a saying when i was in the marine corps that men can hand -- get 10 hours of hand-to-hand combat, but women get off. -- get 12. they do train you to do what you need to do. that's the truth.

we don't need you to give us any special treatment. if we don't need you to do anything different. all the stocks they have of you cannot be this because of certain times of the monks, were different attitudes. those times of the month we may be killing better than you are if we are in combat. so they need to stop. --t: all right. on twitter in damascus, pennsylvania, independent caller, louise. caller: yes, i was in the military probably after the fall of saigon to the iranian crisis. i do believe women can serve and have served. we have always been there, but we have never been recognized. i'm a disabled veteran. i did see there was a difference

in the mos training, but as far as the physical training there was no difference. we outtrains the men and outran the men. we just did not get recognized within the training of the mos's. i agree with your california caller. i wish i could need -- could meet her. it brings tears to my eyes. i thank c-span for putting this on. and i love kirsten gillibrand even though i cannot have a hard to help me. host: what do you want to see from the female senators on the armed services committee? caller: when i saw kirsten gillibrand i said, great. i would love her -- when she said that general overturn the conviction, that never should have happened. i would wish at some point they could force the military to take

a sexual trauma out, because that was even done to me. it was not as bad as some of the women, but it was pretty bad. there was no psychological counseling, because once you fall after a certain date in vietnam, you don't have the counseling, you cannot go to counseling. and 35 years later they say you can go to the va for that. most of us are hitting a 59 or 60, so. host: merideth shiner? guest: it's interesting. it speaks to what the role of congress might be a, to continue oversight as the number of these women increase and kind of issues they face. some issues may be exactly same as men and some may be different. that's why you are seeing some of the lawmakers, male or female, waiting and observing judgment on how to measure the

success of women in combat, how to impose oversight on that, because they just don't know as well yet, because some of those issues may be different. the other thing is the nature of our warfare is different. of theirns, as part temporary blocking of chuck hagel for a secretary of defense, there were seeking more answers on our drug policy. use of rand paul filibuster 14 hours. the way we engage in more fair is changing dramatically. with that it raises a host of questions about our service members, whether male or female. on twitter -- guest: as easy as controlling a drone would be, i assume women can do it just as easily as men. >> on twitter --

that's true. host: we have a minute left, talking with merideth shiner about the impact female senators are having on the armed services committee in the senate. and on military policy. in illinois, a democratic caller. caller: good morning. i'm so happy to see the women onators having an influence women serving in combat roles. i served during vietnam's in the navy, although i was not exposed to combat. some life-ved in threatening situations and i know how i would react. know that i would react cal calmly. i would not be any more

emotional or distressed than a man. had a man tried to strangle me and attempted to rape me. it goes into slow-motion. that i react in slow-motion. to say that women will react any differently than men do, it's too easy to say. n pass theo ca physical or intellect requirements of being in combat, through the training is just as capable of any man and there should not be any restrictions or separate qualifications. they should just let the women do the job and they will do it. host: before we go, what's next on the issue of women in combat roles?